15 Signs You Landed in Buenos Aires

None of the ATMs at Ezeiza International Airport actually dispense cash: you get an error message or the machine is empty. No one familiar with Argentina is surprised and—spoiler alert—the ATMs in the city are also all empty on weekends.

No business has change and banknotes are old and crumbling. Discounts are offered if you pay cash. The odds of getting coins back are lower than winning the lottery.

Cambio (foreign currency exchange) is offered every few metres on Calle Florida and Calle Lavalle by guys yelling “cambio.”

Food revolves around three food groups, the famous “Ps”: pizza, pasta and parilla (barbecue meat). The main dilemmas include picking toppings for your pizza, the sauce for your pasta and the amount of cheese you want with that.

Life starts at 9 p.m., bakeries open until 10 p.m. and restaurants until 1 a.m. It’s perfectly acceptable to play football in the street with your kids at 11 p.m. and catch a movie past midnight.

There are some adult in North America who don’t know that Africa is not a country, so there is some margin.
For Mark’s situation, I would insist to travel by car across the continent. Or, better, by truck. Yeah !

Totally not a stupid question 🙂 We have US$, very much welcome in Argentina. We paid the taxi in US$, the hotel was booked on Expedia. ATMs are often empty on WEs in Buenos Aires, we learned our lesson years ago.